


Ghosting John Watson

by fellshish



Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: Angst, Angst with a Happy Ending, Don't copy to another site, Halloween, M/M, POV Alternating, Post-Reichenbach, Reichenbach Feels, Shippy but could be read as gen, halloweenlock
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-20
Updated: 2020-10-21
Packaged: 2021-03-09 04:28:35
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 4,209
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27118217
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/fellshish/pseuds/fellshish
Summary: It's been two years since the fall. Sherlock is working undercover as a “medium” at a beachside fair, using his deduction skills to make people believe he genuinely is a psychic. One day, a certain John Watson enters his booth, asking for an ouija board session to contact his dead friend...
Relationships: Sherlock Holmes/John Watson
Comments: 124
Kudos: 258
Collections: Sherlock Author Showcase 2020, Spooky Johnlock Collection





	1. When you have no one

**Author's Note:**

> Special thanks to my absolutely brilliant and kind beta 88thparallel, and my beautiful britpicker Thejohnlockoutlet.

“My mother was _murdered_ , Monsieur Cherverrou.”

Behind a long, grey fake beard, and underneath an equally grey wig, a spark ignites. _Oh_. This could be good. This could be extraordinary. This could make this dark evening much brighter. 

“Oh really?” Sherlock says, forgetting to add a French accent. He mustn’t get sloppy - but he has been getting quite bored. He’s been naming _seagulls_ , for christ’s sake.

“Zell me more,” he lets his ‘r’ roll. 

The young boy continues. “She was found in her bed, completely drained…”

“... of blood,” his friend adds. The two of them exchange glances. 

Sherlock finishes his tea. Because these oddly dressed children hate the taste of tea, they’ve agreed that ‘Monsieur Cherverrou’ should be the one to do the drinking. 

It doesn’t matter - it’s a piece of theater, he doesn’t actually read _tea leaves_.

And anyway, these boys are too distracted to notice he’s not looking at the tea. 

He cannot blame them: the place is stacked with taxidermied animals, skeletons and jars containing floating, misshapen creatures. 

A perfect place for children.

“You see but you do not observe,” Sherlock says, for old time's sake. “ _Merde_ . They did not catch the killer, did they, those _terrible policiers_?”

A cold case! A woman completely drained of blood! Is it Christmas?

“No, sir… But my friend and I, we know who did it. My mother’s murderer, you see… he…”

“Yes?” Sherlock leans forward, almost crossing the small space between them over the wonky wooden table. If there was ever an inner voice telling him to hide his enthusiasm about murder, it is now long silenced.

“He sucked!” The boy jumps up, laughing. He exposes his plastic, pointy teeth. “It was Dracula!”

The children giggle. As they run out the door, they yell: “Happy Halloween!”

Right. Not Christmas.

The door slams shut. One of his business cards falls off a nearby shelf and slides up to Sherlock’s shoe. _Monsieur Cherverrou_ , it reads. _Palm reading. Tea leaf reading. Predicting your future, exposing your past. Talking to ghosts if you must. Ouija board incl._

Sherlock Holmes has, in a way, always been a brilliant palm reader. After all, he can identify an airline pilot by his left thumb. So it shouldn’t come as a surprise to anyone, really, that he has found himself disguised as a psychic offering his services in a small, dark booth in the far back of Southend-on-Sea. 

Nearby, there’s a train to nowhere. Quite literally. A train across the longest _pleasure pier_ in the world. There’s a miserable chip shop at the end. He eats there often.

It’s not as if he _wants_ to be here. This was just a convenient cover since he’s currently investigating a part of Moriarty’s web that’s laundering money in this very outdated, rusty beachside fair. This place shouldn’t exist anymore - it shouldn’t be making the kind of money it does. 

All he needs to do is catch the clown who’s running this circus. So going undercover as a psychic was the most logical thing to do.

Luckily, he doesn’t get many customers, tucked away behind the hall of mirrors and sandwiched between a magician and an illusionist. He is a disillusioned island.

Sherlock gets up from the wooden chair, an immediate relief from his lingering back pain. He strokes his fake beard thoughtfully. Halloween…. Might be a busy night, then. God knows he could use the cash, since Mycroft cut him off.

Suddenly, the door opens. The first thing Sherlock picks up on, is the alarmingly familiar scent. 

No. This cannot be. 

Sherlock thinks his heart has, right then and there, stopped beating forever. (Impossible. It stopped two years ago.)

The dark figure halts in the entrance. 

John.

He is perhaps a bit skinnier than Sherlock remembers, and the lines drawn in his face deeper, but there’s no mistaking it. As much as Sherlock wishes it wasn’t… it really is John Watson standing before him.

Sherlock blinks against the intruding light. John… found him? After all this time? John knows he’s not dead? Sherlock sucks in his cheeks. Braces himself. Must he expect a handshake, a greeting, a beating? 

A hug?

None of that. John relaxes his shoulders, shuffles forward and bends over. Only then Sherlock notices his shoes seem bolted to the floor. He cannot run. And now John is so close, he could easily tilt him over. Into the shelves. Everything that was carefully kept in jars, destroyed. 

But John only picks up Sherlock’s business card, and straightens. He politely holds it out.

“You seem to have dropped this, Monsieur Cherverrou.”

This jolts Sherlock out of his illusions. John is not here… for him? He doesn’t recognise him? 

Has he forgotten him that quickly? Rude.

Brilliant disguise, perhaps, Sherlock can’t help feeling a little proud. The wig is only washed bi-monthly, for a more authentic effect. And smell.

“Merci, thank you,” Sherlock says, falling back into his French accent. He attempts to drop his voice a little though, to further elude John. He mustn’t find out it’s him, since John’s life could still be in danger.

Right?

Especially here, in the middle of Moriarty’s web. Surrounded by enemies. He mustn’t… tell him.

Right?

“Have a seat. I’ll make… fresh tea,” Sherlock gestures toward the small wooden table where the tea leaves are still resting at the bottom of a cup. John looks at them, brows drawn.

“I’m not here for that,” John says, but sits down obediently. He doesn’t remove his dark green coat.

Sherlock quickly runs his eyes over him. His hair looks… greyer. His eyes tired. He looks smaller, somehow.

Still _beautiful_.

Sherlock reminds himself to breathe. This is a normal, everyday situation in the life of Monsieur Cherverrou. He’s done dozens of these transactions. But what on earth would John be doing out this late, at the Southend fair?

He’s not here on a date, is he?

Sherlock removes the empty teacup, tries to keep his fingers from shaking. This is fine. John won’t recognise him. It’s been such a long time. He probably barely remembers him.

John clears his throat. “I'm here to speak to a ghost.”

Sherlock inhales sharply.

“Like it says on your card, yeah?” John continues. “You talk to dead people?”

Sherlock sits down on the chair opposite John, and nods. 

“I want to use the ouija board to speak to my deceased friend, Sherlock Holmes,” John says, looking up now, straight into Sherlock’s soul.

What?

No.

“I… I don’t know if I can…”

“It says on your card. You’ve been recommended.”

“I…”

“You’re very good, they say. Please.”

That last word a near whisper. Sherlock briefly closes his eyes. In days long past, Sherlock could never refuse John. 

If this is what John wants. 

“I see… Let me get the…” Sherlock stops. Why bother with the ouija board? That is merely a prop to scare children, amuse teenagers and comfort widows. 

“Did you bring anything of his, by any chance?” Sherlock asks. It is a reach. Probably not, but who knows. 

John stares at him. Then he fumbles in his right trouser pocket, takes out his wallet and slips out a small folded envelope. He opens it and a lock of brown hair falls on the table, between them. 

It is the heaviest thing in the room. 

Sherlock stares at it. He resists the temptation to touch his wig. A knot is forming in his stomach, his back pain acting up. 

The envelope is only a little bit yellowed, so it must have remained untouched for the past two years. But its edges are still rather sharp. Untouched, yet carefully kept safe. 

“Myc… his brother gave me this,” John says.

Sherlock remembers how Mycroft had made him shave his hair off, the day before he left for his first mission, in Belarus. He needed to look more hardened. And he did. Every time he’d look in the mirror, he’d tell himself. Man up. 

Sherlock touches the lock of hair. Still soft.

“Right. This’ll do.”

He uses red chalk to draw a five-pointed star in the middle of the table, and puts the lock of hair on top. Then he surrounds it with small candles. They light John’s eyes on fire.

Sherlock can’t help himself. He really can’t.

“We’ll have to hold hands for this,” he instructs. 

Confusion crosses John’s face for an unbearable instant. Has Sherlock overplayed his hand? But then Sherlock can see his jaw resetting, determinedly, before John stretches his arms on the table. Palms up. 

Sherlock’s hands fall into them naturally. 

It’s an illusion Sherlock would pay for.

“Don’t you need more… information about Sherlock?” John asks.

“No,” Sherlock says. It would be funny if it wasn’t so horrifying. “The lock of hair will do its part. Now, close your eyes and focus your mind’s eye on the middle of the table, and think of your…. friend.”

Sherlock closes his eyes and mumbles in a mixture of Russian, Mandarin and Serbian he picked up in the past couple of years. Always does the trick with these sessions. _Impress a girl._

Sherlock squeezes John’s hands and quits his mumbling. 

“We’re in contact. From now on, I will speak as him. You may open your eyes and speak to your friend.”

Sherlock opens his eyes at the same time.

John looks… pale as a ghost.

“Sherlock?”

“Indeed.” Sherlock says, dropping the French accent at once. “Hello, John.”

John reflexively jolts backward, but Sherlock keeps his grip.

“How…” John pauses, biting his lip. “How do I know it’s really you?”

“Well, it is easily deduced, is it not? You never gave this lowly, vastly overrated and overcharging medium your name. John Hamish Watson.”

John stares, bewildered. Sherlock’s heart beats right out of his chest. Is John seeing right through him? Even in disguise, he feels suddenly naked. 

“What did you say when you first met me?”

“What?”

“What were the first words you said?”

“Afghanistan or Iraq.”

John’s breathing hitches. “It _is_ you,” the words barely escape his lips.

Sherlock holds onto John’s hands as to a life raft. It’s not so much that the room is spinning. it’s that the room was spinning all along and now has stopped. 

“I have questions,” John says, a little louder. Sherlock cannot bring himself to break eye contact, though it feels like risking it all. 

“You always did,” he breathes. 

For Sherlock too, this feels like summoning a ghost. The Sherlock John once knew, died a long time ago. This Sherlock cannot be anymore, the Sherlock who brought pain and sadness upon everyone he knew, the Sherlock who endangered the lives of the people who thought of him as a… friend. 

And yet, that is the Sherlock John’s hands are gripping. 

After a horrifyingly long pause, John breaks the silence.

“H… how are you?”

John bites his upper lip.

“Christ, this is ridiculous,” he continues. “Are you happier?”

No.

“Y- yes.”

John looks struck. Sherlock frowns. Why? This should _comfort_ him. Don’t people want their loved ones to feel safe and happy after death?

“Why did you lie about Mrs Hudson being shot?”

Okay then, going straight into it.

“I needed to be alone.”

“No you didn’t, you daft bastard.” John peers into the candles, breathing heavily. Then he looks up again. “Is Moriarty really dead?”

“Yes and no.”

“What do you mean?”

“Moriarty is… more than a person. It’s a job. It’s a network. There will always be a Moriarty.”

Sherlock hopes John hears the warning in this.

John sighs. 

“Jesus Christ.”

He sounds frustrated. Candlelight throws dancing shadows across his face. Sherlock is lost in the movement of it. He wishes to tell him so much, to comfort him. Then he feels John’s hands tightening around his, as if they’d rather be fists.

“Why…” John starts. 

John’s eyes fill up with moisture, but he clears his throat and Sherlock is not even sure anymore - it could have been just a flick of the light. His mind playing tricks.

John shuffles in his seat. Then his eyes fire up like shots. His whisper, fatal. 

“Why did you kill yourself _in front of me_?”

  
  
  


**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you all so much for reading! I hope you enjoyed it. It's been over a year since I've written fic... It feels great (and scary) to be back.


	2. No one can hurt you

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Previously on 'Ghosting John Watson': John asked 'the ghost of Sherlock' why he killed himself in front of him.

The silence in the small, dark, frankly rancid-smelling booth is deafening. But John doesn’t drop his gaze. No. That’s not what he came here for.

He waits patiently for a frozen Sherlock to gather himself.

The thing is: he doubted for ages before coming here. Even before walking in, he lingered by the door, still not sure if he wanted to do this. 

Exactly two weeks ago ago, he was handed a strange parcel through the open window of an anonymous car. A delivery from Mycroft. The parcel held only a note, and a business card to a beach fair medium. The note was handwritten by Mycroft.

_Go see him. He is not good._

John had pondered over this riddle for a few days. Why would Mycroft want him to see a medium? And more so: one that’s not even good? 

It nagged at him.

Then he finally, reluctantly allowed his mind to actually go back there. Allowed his bruised heart to beat with a flicker of hope. Might it…. might it be Sherlock? Might he be alive? Might he have been living nearby, all along?

No - he’d long abandoned the silly fantasies that Sherlock had faked his death. John had seen the blood, felt his pulse. 

But the note hadn’t let him go.

So he’d traveled to Southend, bought chips and vinegar, casually walked past the booth in broad daylight. There wasn’t anyone in. He’d waited until the evening fell and sat watching from a nearby bench. Saw a tall old man begrudgingly talk to other fair folks. Open his shop to customers.

There was no denying anymore. 

It was Sherlock.

John had gone home that day, feeling so many emotions. Betrayal. Happiness. Hope. Sadness. Anger. 

Sherlock was hiding, and clearly he did not want to be found.

Then today Mycroft had rang him.

“You didn’t talk to him.”

“I’m not your employee, Mycroft. Leave me alone.”

A small pause on the end of the telephone.

“You still live in 221B.”

“That’s none of your business.”

“You haven’t disposed of any of his belongings.”

“That’s on Mrs Hudson, she’s the one who cleans…”

“She’s not your housekeeper.”

“Leave me alone, Mycroft.”

“Did you read my note?”

“Yes.”

“For Christ’s sake, John. Read the note.”

Then Mycroft had hung up. And John had gone back to the note. He is not good. He’s not good. Not. good.

Oh.

Not a bad psychic. But… Not well. 

So now John was sat here. He’d put aside all his anger, to come and check. And hell, underneath that wig and beard, yes, perhaps Sherlock looked skinny, but he always had, hadn’t he? He’d looked at the hands that were holding his. They were soft. Immaculate. No new puncture marks on the arms. 

Sherlock seems sober. 

He’s fallen right into Mycroft’s trap.

Sherlock is _fine_. No, more than that. Sherlock has apparently decided to play another game with him. 

No. 

This time John has the upper hand. 

“Why did you kill yourself in front of me, Sherlock?” John repeats the question slowly. If he didn’t know any better, it would seem like Sherlock flinched with each word. 

He’s probably high on something anyway. 

“I-” Sherlock looks down. “I was saving your life.”

John shakes his head. No. No, Sherlock ended his life, on that pavement. His own, and John’s. 

“Moriarty had snipers, on you, on Lestrade and on Mrs Hudson,” Sherlock rapidly continues now. “If his men didn’t see me jump, didn’t see me _die_ , they’d shoot everyone I… cared for.”

John feels anger boil up. That sounds preposterous. And even so, he could have clued John in. 

“You should have told me! You pushed me away that whole time, Sherlock! Tried to solve the case on your own. For a consulting detective you certainly hate consulting _anyone_.”

Sherlock looks surprised. “I couldn’t involve you, Moriarty would know.” 

As if it’s just one of his little cases with one of his obvious little answers. 

John withdraws his hands from Sherlock’s, and stands up, panting. 

This has gone on too long. It’s clear Sherlock is doing just fine, despite what Mycroft might claim.

And what about the two years - _two bloody years_ \- of John definitely not being fine? Where was Mycroft’s note to _Sherlock_?

Did Sherlock know? Did he just not care?

He looks at those translucent blue eyes, that are now staring back so intensely. Beard or no beard, that is unmistakably Sherlock.

“Sod _this_ ,” John gestures to the whole room, and walks out.

\---

The next morning, getting out of bed, John feels like a dead man rising from the grave. He shouldn’t have gone, shouldn’t have opened that wound. It’s clear Sherlock has no answers. Because the lies, the abandonment, the two year ruse is... unforgivable. 

At least now, he might be able to move on. 

John brushes his teeth, showers, puts on clothes, makes a little too much tea. As if he is performing in a play about his life, acting normal. 

He sips his earl grey, looking at Sherlock’s empty chair.

Then the doorbell rings. 

Mrs Hudson will get that, John assumes. But there is only silence. She must be out for groceries. 

The doorbell rings again. 

When John opens the door, he can’t believe it. 

“I do housecalls,” Sherlock says, in full Monsieur Cherverrou outfit. 

John turns around and pushes the door back, but Sherlock stops it and slips inside.

“How would I know your address?” Sherlock says, following John quickly up the stairs. “Easy, I’m a psychic.”

John can’t believe it. This was supposed to close that door forever. This was to be the end. 

He steps into the living room and paces to the window, trying to compose himself. But when he turns around, he sees that Sherlock is shedding his disguise.

The wig - off.

The beard - gone.

The big smelly coat - disregarded.

Underneath, it is Sherlock. A bit ruffled. His white shirt quite loose around the edges. Definitely lost weight. His hair shorter, yet already curly. His posture tense.

He’s looking at John like a schoolboy who’s not sure if he’ll get laughter or a flogging.

“If you’re expecting me to welcome you home…”

“What?”

“If you’re expecting me to be… Happy…”

Sherlock frowns. His eyes are shifting - he’s deducing. “You knew.”

John inhales sharply. “Yes.”

“You knew and you let me act out that whole piece of appalling theater, yesterday?”

Oh no. No way that Sherlock is going to be pointing fingers at him.

“No, Sherlock. _You_ knew! And you kept lying to me!” 

Sherlock flinches at the raised voice. 

John breathes hard through his nose and looks away. “Don’t turn it around.”

They’re both quiet for a bit.

“I didn’t, by the way,” Sherlock says, speaking carefully as if each word costs him everything he owns. “Expect you to be happy to see me.”

It feels like a blow to John’s stomach. “That’s unfair.”

Sherlock, his shoulders still unnaturally tense, walks to his old chair and touches its edges, softly. When John doesn’t respond, he lowers himself in it.

The sight stuns John.

It’s Sherlock Holmes, back in his chair.

The Sherlock he saw bleeding, the one he felt dying.

“I knew yesterday that I couldn’t hide anymore,” Sherlock says. 

“Don’t think for one second you can come back,” John says. Unsure if he means it. “Like nothing has happened.”

Sherlock frowns. “I would think no such thing.”

John sits down, opposite him.

“Was it Mycroft?” Sherlock asks.

“Stop trying to deduce me as if I were a case.”

A light dims in Sherlock’s eyes. “Right. No.”

“I saw you die, Sherlock. How…” John shakes his head to shake away that memory. “You were dead.”

Sherlock folds his hands together, fingertips touching.

“I knew I needed a plan. That’s why I asked Molly…”

“Molly knew?”

Another blow.

“She… Nobody expected me to care about her.”

Sherlock’s mouth is a flat line now. 

Much like John’s heartbeat. 

“Who else knew?”

“One or two homeless people. That cyclist that hit you to the ground. The… company that sells inflatable things to catch my fall.”

“Mycroft?”

“Yes.”

“Your parents?”

“I couldn’t not tell them.”

“Oh, but you could not tell _me_!” John shakes his head, agitated. “Why are you here, Sherlock? When clearly, you care very little for me.”

Sherlock looks struck. He rubs the chair, then puts his hands in his lap. 

“You forgot to ask me, yesterday,” he says more quietly.

“What?”

“I owe you…” he says.

“Yes.”

“An explanation. What I have been doing while I was… dead.”

“You can try.”

“Your life was in danger. Not only yours, but Mrs Hudson’s and Lestrade’s. I knew I couldn’t come back before I’d dismantled Moriarty’s entire network, that stretched as far as Russia, parts of Asia, a little in the Middle East …”

“Oh, you were _traveling_.”

That seems to throw Sherlock. He clears his throat. “I spent the last two years destroying that network from the inside out. It cost time, and money. It cost more than you can imagine, John.”

“Come off it! That sounds like our everyday life!” John unclenches his fist. He doesn’t mean to shout. “I… could have helped you.”

In a way, Sherlock is confirming his deepest suspicions. He never _needed_ John.

Sherlock rubs between his eyebrows. “It was dangerous, John.”

John stands up and paces to the window, then to Sherlock’s chair. He’s never felt this agitated. “We’ve always faced danger together, Sherlock! Always!” 

He finds himself pointing a finger close to Sherlock’s face. 

Sherlock tenses, but doesn’t move away. 

He looks into John’s eyes.

“What if you left with me and something terrible would have happened to Mrs Hudson? Would you have risked it?”

John’s anger subsides, but he knows it is just one wave retreating in the large ocean that he is. He sits back down opposite Sherlock. 

“Did you ever even…” John bites his lip. He can’t say it.

 _Think of me_.

“I mourned you, Sherlock,” he spits out. He mustn’t cry. 

Sherlock can’t even hold his gaze. Coward.

“You let me grieve, for two years, Sherlock. Do you have any idea what that was like?” John continues, gripping the sides of his chair. He can feel the next wave coming. 

“I - I don’t.”

John exhales. 

Sherlock stands up.

“I shouldn’t have come here. I see that now.”

John looks at Sherlock in a daze. That’s it? It feels like an abandonment all over again. 

Never did he imagine Sherlock walking back into this apartment again, yet he preserved 221b like a living memory. 

Now Sherlock is leaving him in ruins. 

“You’re right,” John angrily says, standing back up from his chair. “Take your ridiculous wig and beard and get out of here before Mrs Hudson comes back from Tesco’s. We don’t want to scare her to death.”

Sherlock has turned his back on him now, bending over to pick up his fake beard. But when John puts a hand between his shoulder blades to encourage him to hurry up, Sherlock welps a little.

John freezes.

He looks at Sherlock, now. _Really_ looks. Near his collar, leading up to the back of his neck, there is a small red stain on his white blazer. Sherlock starts to straighten but John stops him.

“Hold still, please.”

“John-”

“Hold bloody still or I swear to God-”

John reaches for Sherlock’s collar and gently pulls it back a little, revealing part of his back. It is… shocking. A barely healed battlefield of long, stretched out wounds, among pathways of older scars. 

John lets Sherlock go, and he slowly stands upright, back still turned to him,

“Who hurt you?” John near-whispers. 

He could have protected him.

Sherlock seems frozen in place, in time. 

“Who hurt you?” 

Who should John hurt?

“It’s nothing, John,” Sherlock tells the wall.

“You need medical attention.”

“I’m already dead.”

“Mycroft surely has-”

“Mycroft has done enough,” Sherlock says firmly, and reaches for his coat.

John steps around so he can look him in the eye. 

“What did Mycroft do?”

He’ll _kill_ him.

Sherlock looks like he’s using all his strength to stand still. “Risk of the job, John. I was caught in Serbia. I managed to send Mycroft a message just before it happened. But it took him… weeks.”

Sherlock swallows, dropping his emotionless mask for only an instant.

“I truly am sorry, John. In my mind I was back here… countless times.”

It nearly breaks John. He couldn’t help him then, but he still can, now.

“As your doctor, I am ordering you to let me look at your scars.”

Sherlock steadies himself. “The scars are fine, they’re _nothing_. It’s just a small tear, they’re healing.” 

Sherlock pushes his lips together.

And then it suddenly dawns on John.

“There is no case in Southend.”

“What?” Sherlock blinks rapidly.

“Mycroft sent you there right after Serbia, right?”

“Yes, undercover. They’re… laundering… criminals… They’re….”

Sherlock falls silent. Deducing, John assumes.

“Mycroft wanted you to find me,” Sherlock finally says. 

“Yes.”

“There is no case.” Sherlock slowly repeats. 

He sounds absolutely lost.

John reaches over and puts a hand on Sherlock’s beating heart. “Yes, there is.”

  
  


**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm extremely touched by how well this story has been received. Thank you all so much <3

**Author's Note:**

> The chapter titles are lyrics from the song 'You will miss me when I burn' by Will Oldham. Though I prefer Bonnie Prince Billy's version.


End file.
